The Voice of Hardrock – Part 5: It’s a Girl!

Diana Finkel and Karl Meltzer talk about the 2010 Hardrock 100 when Diana nearly won outright and Karl didn’t finish in the fifth of six installments in Evan Honeyfield’s Voices of Hardrock video series.

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The Voice of Hardrock – Part 5: It’s a Girl! Transcript

Karl Meltzer: Man, I remember even just two years ago, I was climbing out of Ouray towards Engineer. I was kind of not really having a good day; I was just kind of going. It was the year Diana Finkel was in the front for all day until Jared caught her. I was climbing out of Ouray towards Engineer and I caught Scott Jaime. Scott was just sitting here on a rock just kind of looking around, a little glazed. I was like, “You know, freakin’ Hardrock, huh, Jaime?” “Yeah.” So I sat down on a rock by him and had a little conversation. That’s just a little tiny thing, but you remember times like that. Scott and I had a moment and then we moved on. He slogged out of there. A couple hours later, Scott and I took a nap for an hour and a half at Grouse. Scott, like a man, got up and continued. I wussed out and went home. It was pretty funny when we were sitting in the tent. “Hey Scott, how’s it going?” “Hey Karl, we’re racing, huh?” Yeah, we’re racing at 0 mph sitting in a tent.

Diana Finkel: Did you talk to Scott Jaime? He was in the lead, and I passed him. You know, I was out of Ouray and it was sort of in this little switch back section. It was in the trees, so I couldn’t really see him except for sometimes through the trees. So then I passed him, and I thought he was moving great. So we talked to each other and I was like, “Good job! You look good. You look strong.” He said, “I’m going through a lull.” I said, “Ah, it will come back,” whatever, you know, the normal conversations that you have with people out there. But he was really great. I thought he was really very positive; he looked pretty good. He didn’t look like he was on death’s doorstep. Then he said at the end of the race when I talked to him, “I was going to kill you. I felt (you know you always have these terrible lows), I felt like crap! I was just vomiting and you were telling me I looked great!” Well, I didn’t see that. But I remembered that he wanted to kill me. But I didn’t know, I didn’t hear the vomit. But I remember that. Then I remember… his dad was pretty loud. His dad is like this big guy and he’s very gregarious, and he was at the aid stations out there. We were kind of near each other that year, so I always saw him at the aid stations. So after that one, I was like, “Oh, Scott’s coming.” His dad was pretty cool because he’s like, “We’re glad you passed him.” They were sort of on the girl power thing, so it was kind of cool.

Related articles:

1. The Voice of Hardrock – Part 3: Course Marking A look at what course marking and route finding is like at the Hardrock 100....
2. The Voice of Hardrock – Part 6: To Evolve Hardrock 100 veterans talk about if and how the race should evolve....
3. The Voice of Hardrock – Part 4: Virginius Veteran Hardrock 100 runners describe tackling Virginius....

Filed under Races, Video · Tagged with Diana Finkel, Hardrock 100, Karl Meltzer

Evan Honeyfield , a former and hopefully future ultrarunner lives in the high desert of Idaho and recently had LASIK. He carries his gel in UltrAspire gear, his sole sponsor. He learned about compassion and empathy in 2012 and is hoping to see the world clearer in 2013.
All posts by Evan Honeyfield